


marigolds and hydrangeas

by spacepuck



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Derse, Domestic, M/M, Prospit, in which the boys are old and john daydreams in the garden
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-11
Updated: 2017-07-11
Packaged: 2018-11-30 16:35:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11467434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacepuck/pseuds/spacepuck
Summary: He laughs—it’s become softer over the years, no longer the big boisterous full-chested noise it was when you were young—and it makes the creases in his face deepen for a moment. He reaches out to touch your hand, and you hold his fingers loosely in your grip.“Done daydreaming?” you ask.“Mm, I guess so,” he says, sparing another look out at the garden. “The hydrangeas are looking very vibrant this year.”“Mhmm.” Then, squeezing his fingers lightly, “What were you daydreaming about this time?”“Oh, the same old stuff. Just remembering Prospit.”-In which John and Dave are much older, and John frequently daydreams.





	marigolds and hydrangeas

The springtime is coming to a close. You can tell because the purple hydrangea bushes are starting to bloom at the edges of the backyard. John has always liked them; you never really cared, and flowers were really never your thing, but you smiled when he would mention the summertime garden to you anyway. 

“And the marigolds are blooming again.” He had said this to you over breakfast, as you held your warm drink in your wrinkled hands. “They remind me of Prospit.” 

“I know. I’m glad,” you said. His crow’s feet then became even more pronounced as he smiled broad at you from across the small kitchen table, and you smiled softly into your mug. 

He sits on the back porch, avoiding the sun hitting the front of the house, and looks out at the backyard quietly. From the kitchen, you watch him—even after fifty years of living together, you sometimes think to yourself _goddamn it, Dave, stop staring at him like a weirdo in need of a prom date_ —but when you see him grin lightly at nothing in particular, you feel your whole being soften. 

You know you need to bring him back inside soon, but you’re feeling a little selfish. _Just for a lil’ while longer_ , you tell yourself. On the days where he lets himself daydream, sometimes for hours, you never have the heart to pull him away. It’s then that he looks so at peace with himself, so _young_ , that you think it would be a fucking crime to pull him away. 

So you busy yourself with finishing dinner, setting the table and the usual jazz, while sneaking peeks at him from the corner of your eye. He doesn’t budge at all, save for the slow, melodic tapping of his fingers against the chair’s armrests. There’s some song playing in his head. You wonder if he’ll play it for you later, or if he’ll forget by then. 

A small pang of guilt hits you when you set dinner on the table, because he hasn’t come back from his daydream just yet. It’s one of those days where he could probably go on until the night sets in and forces him to stop looking out into the garden, or until he actually falls asleep, but you know neither of you can wait that long. You slaved over a mildly hot stove for him, damn it. 

Still, you try to open the back door as quietly as possible to keep from startling him. When you close it behind you, his head ticks just slightly over his shoulder. 

“Oh, Dave,” he says, and he looks up at you as you stand beside his chair. He blinks slow behind his glasses. “Geez, what time is it?”

“Time for you to—”

“—get a watch, ha-ha, you’re old and cliché as usual.”

“Rude, I was going to say ‘time for you to get off your ass’.”

“Well, you’re still old,” he mutters under a smile. 

“Wow, tou-fucking-ché. You really got me there, John.”

He laughs—it’s become softer over the years, no longer the big boisterous full-chested noise it was when you were young—and it makes the creases in his face deepen for a moment. He reaches out to touch your hand, and you hold his fingers loosely in your grip. 

“Done daydreaming?” you ask. 

“Mm, I guess so,” he says, sparing another look out at the garden. “The hydrangeas are looking very vibrant this year.” 

“Mhmm.” Then, squeezing his fingers lightly, “What were you daydreaming about this time?”

“Oh, the same old stuff. Just remembering Prospit.” 

You nod slowly. 

Some time ago, when he had first started daydreaming and getting lost in himself, he had first mentioned Prospit to you. You two had been nearing fifty (you remember the thickening patches of grey forming in his sideburns and crown), and he had been leaning against the sink, staring at the small windowsill garden he had planted the month before. 

“Do you remember Prospit?” he had asked. He didn’t even look at you—you had just about wandered into the kitchen. 

“What?” you asked. 

“Or Derse,” he said. “That was where you were from—Derse.” 

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, man.”

He sighs, and his voice softens. “I just remember Prospit being so _yellow_. Like it was always daytime, even though we were asleep.” 

You had paused, wanting to ask him if he had taken his medication that day, but you decided against it. Up to this day, you never asked. When you realized the daydreams weren’t going to go away, you decided to just shut up and listen. 

The way he described Prospit and Derse had always mesmerized you, even though you doubt you could ever really picture them exactly as he had imagined. He told you about Prospit’s high golden towers, the tall gold spires on Prospit’s moon thickly chained to the planet. He told you about the White Queen and the creatures that roamed in the constant daytime. 

When he told you about Derse, he called it a “planet of shadows”. You had joked on more than one occasion that it had been sent to the shadow realm, but he never really laughed at the comment. He only nodded in agreement. He eventually confided in you that he never really saw Derse, but he did once tell you that you came from the Red Room. 

You never could figure out what that meant, and he only shrugged when you tried asking. He had told you that you were the one that should know, and you left it at that. 

John shifts beside you in his chair and exhales slowly. He gently tugs his fingers out of your grasp to settle his hand on his lap. 

“I don’t think I miss Prospit,” he says. “I can hardly remember the darned place anyway. But I suppose I miss the adventure of it all.” 

“The adventure?” you ask, and he nods. 

“Mm. Do you remember when we were young, Dave? We had gone on an epic quest.” 

You shake your head. You can’t remember much of your childhood at all, even though you feel like you would remember having an adventure with him. Though, you suppose, it’s just his imagination running. 

“I don’t. I’m an old coot, remember? I might as well have started my life when I was thirty, because everything before that has been washed down-river straight into the middle of the ocean. The sharks have probably eaten it all up.”

“Hmm. Maybe they think they had once been on an adventure, then.”

“They’re sharks, John. They’re always on an adventure.” 

He chuckles at that. 

“Anyways. It’s a shame you don’t remember. I can’t remember it very well, either, but I do remember the fight of it all. I think we even died a few times.” 

You snort. “Yeah, I can feel _that_ in my bones.”

“Well, I think _you_ died a lot more than I did.”

“Oh yeah? How do you know?”

He then looks up at you with a grin. 

“Have you looked in a mirror? You _look_ like you’ve died a thousand times.”

You feign a hurt gasp, and softly shove his shoulder. He suddenly laughs as full as he can, breaking the relative peace of the nearing sundown.

“John Egbert, I want a divorce. I just can’t stand the abuse anymore,” you say. He just waves you off.

“Oh, shut up, you old loser. I would stay with you even if you looked like you died _two_ thousand times.” 

You feel yourself smile involuntarily, even though you shove him gently again. 

“Jerk,” you murmur. “You can’t butter me up after insulting me. That’s cheating.” 

“No, that’s strategy. Besides, I don’t look any less ancient that you.”

“Hey, you said it, not me.”

He smiles up at you before looking out at the garden again. You know that your dinner is starting to get cold, and it’s time for him to take his evening medication, but you still don’t have the heart to pull him away just yet. He fidgets slowly with his hands, rubbing his knuckles between his fingertips.

“I think we were gods once,” he says, voice lowered and suddenly thoughtful, “I think we saved the world.” 

A small hum comes out of you, and you stand beside him not knowing what to say. After a moment, you lay your hand softly on top of his greyed hair and pet the cowlicks back. He doesn’t respond to the touch.

Years ago, in his early daydreams of Prospit and Derse, he had told you that when you two were young you had been separated for quite some time. You reminded him that you had literally lived thousands of miles apart as children, but he just shook his head, brows furrowing in slight frustration. 

“No, no, I don’t mean _that_ ,” he said quickly. “I mean—even in our dreams we were far away from each other.”

When you had asked what he meant, he stuttered for some time before saying that he couldn’t explain. 

Now, as he turns his head to look up at you again under your hand, you just feel grateful that the distance—whether in reality, or in your dreams, or both—is something you haven’t had to worry about for a long, long time.

Jesus, look at you getting sappy. 

As you exhale, loud and slow, you ruffle his hair. “Alright, ya geezer. Dinner’s probably frozen by now.”

“You made dinner?” he asks. He takes some time to stand, and he stubbornly swats away your hand as you reach to help him up. 

“Yeah, that’s why I came out to get you. Didn’t you realize the sun was going down?”

He shrugs. His hand wraps around the crook of your elbow as he thinks. 

“Hm, I guess not. It’s always sunny on Prospit, remember? Guess I just didn’t notice.” 

When you get inside, you realize you need to reheat dinner, and you grumble about it as John downs some of his pills with water and just laughs at you as you have to lean in close to read the microwave’s buttons. But when you sit across from him at the table, your reheated dinner making your worn cheeks feel warm, you can’t help but return his smile.

Soon after, it’s bedtime. After an exchange of “I love you’s” and soft caresses and wrinkle-lipped kisses (which still make both of you laugh and wonder how the fuck you’ve gotten so old), John falls asleep before the night even sets in full. He always falls asleep before you. And though it takes you some time longer to fall asleep, you don’t mind watching him drift off peacefully in the dark. You listen to his slow breathing. Eventually, you listen to his snores. 

It takes some time, but eventually you too settle in to sleep. And maybe—probably, you think retrospectively—it’s just the power of suggestion, but you wake in the early morning feeling as though you’ve just wandered through the long passageways of a violet world. 

When you tell John over breakfast, you think you see him tearing up despite giving you a wide, bright smile. 

“Maybe you should daydream with me,” he says. 

And you nod, smiling soft into your morning mug of coffee like you often do. 

You suppose it’s not too late to try to remember.

**Author's Note:**

> a very late finale to johndave week! i just wanted to write something about them being old. thanks for reading!
> 
> hmu @ spacepuck.tumblr.com


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